Chapter V The Ship “Macbeth.” — Horrible Mutiny
Wind some points abaft the beam, the Macbeth on the starboard tack, and heeling prettily over to it, doing about ten knots.
On such a morning as this, in these warm and sparkling seas, on which showers of diamonds seemed to be falling, with the light blue overhead and the darker below, who could help being joyful.
In their curious and mixed “garble” the men laughed and joked, and even sang as they sluiced the water about and plied their scrubbers.
Now and then half a watch, obedient to the mate’s command, would take a pull at the traces, “Lee-hoe-ing” as they did so, as musically as the song of the sea-birds, until the shout “Belay!” fell on their ears.
By sunset of that first day every man was acquainted with his quarters, so to speak, and the crew had settled down. The skipper, first and second mates, and bo’s’n lived in the saloon, the older and best men, chips, the cooper, and so forth were in the half-deck, and forward, below or above deck, as suited them, the rest of the crew bunked.
Despite the terrible tale which Dolphin had told him, the tragedy of last voyage, Kep thought he was bound to be happy. At the same time he had already made up his mind that he would try to find another vessel when they reached Sidney. So he waited at table, he helped cook and steward, and he piped or played to the men in the evening, as well as being interpreter to the crew. He found that none of the officers or crew, except Dolphin, had been in her last voyage; I suppose the skipper made sure of that.
The men had all nicknames which seemed to grow upon them, or be suggested by their general appearance. There was one low-built squat fellow his comrades called “Kruger.” A black man of gigantic strength “Slogger.” From the first Kep was half afraid of this fellow. His great bare black feet and ankles, his immense naked neck and tattoed chest, his brutal figure-head and daring looks, all were repulsive. And he was so black that when in the sunshine he scratched one forearm, he left white streaks on it. But he was a good seaman. There was only one worse-looking man in the ship, though he was white. This was “Bloody Tom.” Then there was “Long-shanks,” expressive enough; “Spider-legs,” the “Turk,” and so on and so forth.
These I have named were the men that really dominated the rest of the crew, and whom, some time after this, Kep had good reason to remember.
They all of them, notwithstanding their looks, were good to Kep. This almost goes without saying, for away forward, after sundown, he could spin yarns that kept them laughing by the hour.
The Turk turned out a decent kind of hulk, and Kep would tell even him droll stories in his own tongue.
One day this man, while alone with Kep in the ship’s waist, asked the boy to feel the keenness of a huge knife he carried.
“If anything ever happens,” he told the boy, “I’ll be your friend.”
This Turk was called the “Prophet.” Why, Kep could not tell.
The Macbeth was partly in ballast, but she landed a good deal of stuff at Rio and took in much more heavy cargo. No man on board, except the captain, knew what this cargo was. It consisted chiefly of huge, square, very heavy boxes.
Some thought it must be specie, but the Turk declared it was sand.
But why sand? We shall soon see. The ship was now stretching away down the South Atlantic, and in good time for such a slow and heavy sailer she doubled Cape Horn, and now bore north and west. Dolphin said he had no faith in the skipper, and that he merely told this story of their being bound for the Cape as a blind. He was going to do something bad. Dolphin was sure of this.
Dolphin told Kep one night after they had retired, told him in French and in whispers, that when the skipper was on deck the day before, and it was “all hands shorten sail,” he had found papers in the old man’s stateroom which proved that the Macbeth was a coffin ship, and that he and the first mate had agreed for a large sum of money to scuttle and sink her first chance. There was to be no bloodshed if possible. The men were to take to the boats when not far off a certain island, and would be picked up by another vessel sent on purpose by the same company.
The Macbeth, of course, with her supposed cargo of considerable value, was heavily insured.
It might not be supposed that in the year of our Lord 1906, the date of this tale, such things could be possible; but list, my lads. Though this story is predated, the facts actually occurred only a few years ago. And what happened in 1901 may well occur in 1906. As you are not reading fiction altogether, I like to paint the sea and sea-life in as bright colours as I can, but ah! while there is a romance about it, which is beautiful and glorious, the sea also hath its perils and its grim tragedies; and we are bound sometimes to look at the dark side.
Kep did not sleep a deal that night. He lay long awake thinking, and when slumber did at last seal his eyelids, it brought with it dreams that had more terror in them than even his waking thoughts.
The ship anyhow had not only proved herself a leaky and unseaworthy tub, the rattle of the pumping engine being heard in every watch, but the crew speedily became a discontented one. The skipper and first mate were only pleasant towards evening, while in their “cups.” By day they behaved, often enough, like very fiends to the men. Rope’s-ending was a daily matter of occurrence; men, lashed to the lower rigging, especially the young ones, were often heard shrieking in their agony.
One poor fellow was booted off the poop by the captain himself, and though his leg was smashed, he was clapped in irons for what was called mutinous conduct.
Adolphus now set himself to watch the captain and mate, who of a night used to be very much together in the chief state-room.
The steward about ten o’clock would beg leave to retire.
“Put the brandy and glasses in my room, then, and you may go, Dolphin,” would be the usual reply.
But as soon as the saloon was in darkness and he could hear the sounds of carousal in the state-room, Dolphin crept on hands and knees towards the sanctum. The two conspirators one night had the chart between them.
“It is down here, just off these islands, we are to do the job,” the former was saying.
He placed a finger on the chart as he spoke; and, raising himself gently—for death would have speedily followed discovery—the steward drew aside the curtain till he could see the very spot the finger indicated.
The mate started. “I declare I saw the curtain move, sir.”
“The motion of the ship, you donkey.”
“But I declare I saw a white face peep in.”
“Here—here—drink this quickly, or you’ll have those ‘D.T.’s’ again.”
Adolphus had slipped speedily back, and he declared to Kep that should he live till doomsday he would not forget the expression on that evil mate’s face.
The ship was steered south and away now, and every day the weather got colder and colder. Adolphus had been long at sea, and probably knew as much about plain-sailing as the mate himself, and every time he had a chance he studied the chart, the compass, and the mate’s reckoning slate.
“It cannot be long now,” he told Kep one evening; “the wind is going down. We’ll be becalmed to-morrow, mark my words, not far from the spot where the deed is to be done—the ship scuttled.”
He was right, and next morning there was almost a complete calm. A round heaving swell, however, was coming in from the south-east, and the vessel rolled and pitched in a very uncomfortable fashion. The third mate came down below to report that she was making more water than ever.
“Strained herself, I suppose,” growled the skipper. “She’s only a bally old clothes’-basket at best. Waal, put more hands to the spare pumps and keep the engine going.”
The third mate went on deck, and almost immediately after there was a hail from the mast-head.
“Land on the port bow!”
A long, low, cloud-like streak, with here and there a conical hill, that is all the men saw, and probably only the captain and mate knew what that land really was.
There was a gloom over the ship this forenoon that not even the bright sunshine could dispel. Now and then the land was obscured as if by rising clouds or fog.
Hardly a sound to be heard save that of the pumps at work. Never a word of command. The idle men in groups here and there about the fo’c’sle or ship’s waist, but all silent and moody, though they cast wondering glances aft occasionally to where on the poop the skipper was walking up and down with the mate.
The quiet to-day seemed ominous. Nature herself appeared to be waiting and waiting for something to happen.
The skipper paused in his walk to leisurely fill his pipe, casting now and then furtive glances at the mate.
“God! sir,” cried the latter at last, “don’t look at me like that. See, sir, we—that is you and I—are both shareholders in this ship. If our plan succeeds we will win the stakes, but if I thought you meant to play me false, by heavens! I’d scupper you on the spot. You say it is all square between us? Then—don’t eye me again like that.”
“It is all right, mate, and you know it. There! don’t be a fool. Go below and have some rum to straighten you out a bit.”
“I’ve had too much. I’ll be seeing things soon.”
“Hillo! Dolphin. What do you want?”
“I came to know if I should draw enough grog to splice the main-brace.”
“Do as you please. Go to the devil if you like.”
The steward said no more. Leaving the two together, he hurried below, and entered the skipper’s state-room. The spirit-room door was already open, and Kep was waiting for the men’s grog. Dolphin opened a drawer, the keys of which had been left in it, and quickly and quietly possessed himself of a pair of revolvers and several ugly-looking knives. These he put in the pantry, and, returning, secured a hammer and chisel which were under the little chart-table.
That was all. The skipper came below and looked at him somewhat suspiciously.
“Been making your bed, sir. Shall you want some ‘fizz’?”
“Yes. Ah! you know my little ways and weaknesses.”
“I do,” said Dolphin to himself.
The grog was served out, and, as usual, Kep piped to the crew while they ate their dinners. And so the afternoon wore on till within an hour of sunset.
Dolphin was forward again with a huge can containing double allowance of rum.
“Saturday night, gentlemen, and the captain says it is his birthday, and you are to drink his health.”
Kep served out the double dose. Dolphin was talking down in the galley, talking seriously, but somewhat excitedly, with Kruger, Slogger, and the Turk.
“There must be no blood. We’ll do things better than that. I’ll give the signal.”
Good luck or the devil seemed to be playing into Dolphin’s hands, for just as he entered the saloon again he noticed the door of the skipper’s state-room being silently shut. Both he and the mate were in there. Like a tiger on its prey, he sprang silently aft, and next moment the door was locked—the conspirators were prisoners.
They had heard the click of the lock, however, and at once began shaking the door.
“What in thunder does this mean?” roared the mate. “Dolphin, you devil, I’ll have your life’s blood.”
“Listen!” replied Dolphin calmly; “if you remain quiet you will be safe; if not, I cannot be accountable for your lives.”
The men by this time were fully alive to the horror of the situation.
The ship was slowly sinking. By either mate or master or by both she had been scuttled, and now these men were prisoners. They must get out the boats and leave her and those devils to their doom. Why work the pumps a moment longer?
There were many discontented voices, but evil took the lead, and Slogger, the terrible-looking negro, took command—the black would rule the white as an evil spirit ruled all.
“Aft, men; aft!” he shouted. “Let us up with the boats, get provisions and arms, and down with the men who would prevent us.”
The brute bared his arm and flourished a knife as he spoke.
The Turk had run towards the saloon just as the mischief began to brew.
“You won’t be safe, friend boy,” he cried to poor Kep. Then he hurried the lad into his little cabin and locked the door.
He met the leader and mutineers as they were making aft.
“No blood,” he cried. “Shed no blood.”
The black man dashed him to the deck. Not stunned though, it would take a deal to quiet so powerful a Turk, he was on his feet in a moment; knives glittered, and the two were in deadly embrace. Both fell, but only one rose, and a rivulet of blood was straggling towards a scupper hole. The black man was triumphant.
It was the spirit-room that was first stormed, and soon the rum began to do its deadly work. Kep trembled in his den to hear the singing, shouting, and stamping. But there were wiser men on deck, and very quickly and even orderly the boats were hoisted to the davits and loaded. Some of the cases were opened, and found to contain sand, not specie.
I do not wish to redden my pages by describing the fearful scenes that followed, when the mutineers in the saloon quarrelled and fought.
Sounds of thuds and blows and shrieks and groans! It must indeed have been a terrible pandemonium.
After this, silence for a time. A consultation was evidently being held on deck. It was followed by a rush of feet down into the saloon again, and Kep could hear that the captain’s stateroom was being opened—could hear the captain’s voice, too, appealing for mercy.
Mercy from mutineers! He was being dragged on deck. A wild scream and a splash alongside—that was the mercy.
But for the mate a more ghastly doom was reserved. Dead men tell no tales, but a derelict ship may. The Macbeth might not sink soon enough. She might float till sunrise and be found by the islanders, the very islanders on whose shores the mutineers were to land with a lie on their lips.
The mate, then, was gagged and bound and laid on the state-room deck. Not far from him was placed a barrel of gunpowder, and in this a lighted candle was stuck. When it tilted or fell, or when it burned down say in two hours’ time, the gunpowder would explode and the mate, who had kicked the poor young sailor off the poop, would go to his doom, and the ship be blown to pieces.
A whole hour went past, such a silent, such a nightmare hour, and Kep knew he was alone in a sinking ship with the dead.
Poor boy! he could do nothing there but weep and pray.
But he started up presently; there was a scuffling, rasping noise overhead, and coming nearer and nearer to the companion. Now he could hear a groan, then some one staggered or half fell down the companion.
The key was turned in Kep’s cabin-door, and next moment he was free.
“Thank Allah! I could not come before.” It was the voice of the poor faithful Turk.
He never spoke more. He lay there dead and still in the passage.